In these outrageously funny fables, featuring animals with unmistakably human failings, New Yorker and public radio humorist David Sedaris holds up a bestial mirror to our own neuroses, illustrated with hilarious drawings by Olivia creator and New Yorker cartoonist Ian Falconer. In "The Toad, the Turtle, and the Duck," three strangers commiserate about animal bureaucracy while waiting in a complaint line, and in "The Sick Rat and the Healthy Rat," two lab subjects debate the powers of positive thinking. The title story features a pair of star-crossed lovers, separated by prejudiced family members, while "The Grieving Owl" relates the humiliation of a once-proud owl after his family discover who his new friends are.